Книжка-6

1964 Booklet 6 Contents

A year has passed since the Fifth International Congress of Slavists in Sofia concluded its work. The contribution of the congress was undeniable, and the fruitful impetus it gave has long been carried over to the dozens of centers of contemporary Slavic studies. However, a scientific congress is of interest not only for its scientific contributions in themselves. Of no less interest is the methodology of scientific research that it demonstrates. In the swarm of topics and problems of the Fifth Congress of Slavists, almost all the more significant methodological directions stood out, the main philosophical schools were refracted, and from there - the main class-party positions in science today. A study of the methodology of scientific research, as it was presented at the congress, would provide material for very interesting conclusions. The scope of the present notes is, for understandable reasons, much more limited: they concern only two reports. However, the philosophical and methodological positions from which their authors proceed are widespread in Western literary studies. And this makes these two studies typical and in a sense representative of the state and directions of Western Slavic studies today.

From the years when the first "songs", "sighs" and "trembles" appeared, which speak of the youthful intoxication of the twenty-year-old poet (1894-97), to the "last fires" of the creative fire of his restless lyre (1944), five whole decades passed. In this half-century rich and complex period of the development of our literature, Kiril Hristov was a very active creator.

Science studies the objective essence of reality independently of human evaluative attitude towards it; its element is this: to reveal the nature of things and phenomena - their objectively real signs and the connections, dependencies and regularities to which they obey, without being interested in the subjective attitude of man to the reality being studied. Art, on the contrary, reflects the world unconditionally through the ideological-emotional assessment of the artist. Therefore, the problem of expressing the ideological-emotional sphere of the artist and his individual vision of the world is directly related to any artistic creation. Without the manifestation of the artistic attitude towards the object, there is no art; but expression is not yet art at all. For Marxist aesthetics, the latter is an organic unity of knowledge and expression, a reflection of the world in its objective significance and an expression of the subjective evaluative attitude and vision of reality on the part of the creative personality.

A writer with a high aesthetic culture, with serious care for style and language, Konstantinov stands apart from writers with openly expressed militant anti-fascist sentiments. Deeply embedded in his convictions is the thought that moral laws surpass political passions. But behind the calm contemplation of his books one feels a man with a civic, social conscience, tormented by questions about man and human existence, in love with life and suffering for its imperfection. A subtle poetic feeling makes him responsive to any suffering, to human life and to nature.

In the vast literature on the life and work of Hristo Botev, there is no more comprehensive study of the impact that the genius of the Bulgarian nation has exerted for decades on the development of our literary and social thought. The question of Botev's participation in the ideological, political and literary struggles of other peoples has not been considered in a broader sense. Only a few popular articles, and most notably Minko Nikolov's study "Botev in the ideological and poetic path of Vazov", printed in 1956 in book two of the Botev-Levski Institute Bulletin, as well as the article "Hristo Botev in Serbian and Croatian literature", published in volume four of the Slavic Collection, 1963, examine individual moments of this so multifaceted and so vital impact. Zdenek Urban's study "The Activity and Creativity of Hristo Botev and the Czech Republic in the 1970s and 1980s" also has such a character, published in 1959 in book three of the Proceedings of the Botev-Levski Institute.

From the literary circle "Luch" in Yambol (1912) to Geo Milev's "Plamak" (1924), Georgi Sheitanov traveled an interesting path of a revolutionary and poet, for whom struggle and poetry are inseparable, because in them lies true life - life even in death. Nurtured by revolutionary ideas in their most extreme manifestations, while still a high school student, Sheitanov set out on the thorny path of rebellion and struggle. A violent, irreconcilable young man, he could not tolerate either the feldwebel discipline in the school of that time, or the hollow authorities, or the injustices in life. The son of a farming family, raised in the poor neighborhood of Kargona, from childhood he saw the weight of the people. Books opened his eyes. From books he learned that misery and oppression would be eliminated when the slave rebelled. And so Sheitanov leaves high school and takes the path of struggle. His first "action" is to set fire to the district court in his hometown in order to destroy the cases of his fellow defendants. Later, he himself will call this and other similar actions of his "quixotic", from which the first period of his turbulent and short life, filled with many twists and turns, is woven. Because revolutionary experience will tell him that only mass action and struggle of the working people, armed uprising and revolution are the only ways to overthrow the predatory and oppressive capitalist system...

Mikhail Yurievich Lermontov is one of the undisputed peaks of Russian and world revolutionary-romantic poetry. His ideological and artistic formation entirely refers to the period after the defeat of the Decembrist uprising of 1825. It is precisely the period between 1828 and 1837 that is unusually rich both in the poet's personal life and in events that changed the face of Russian society at that time. The reactionary policy that Nicholas I established towards all democratic strata remained unchanged almost until his death. It is significant that for thirty years (1825-1855) 674 uprisings took place in Russia according to official data, but in reality there must have been much more. Characterizing this historical period, V. I. Lenin wrote: "This is the era from the Decembrists to Herzen. Serfdom Russia is oppressed and immobile. An insignificant minority of the nobles protested, powerless without the support of the people. But the best people of the nobles helped to awaken the people." At the same time, the class struggle intensified in the West - in England the Chartist movement was developing, in France the July Revolution broke out, in Italy the Young Italy society was developing revolutionary and liberation activities. To a certain extent, these events found an echo in the highly sensitive Lermontov, helping to build him as a poet of the post-Decembrist era. This is even a whole line that was outlined in Lermontov's development as early as his entry into Moscow University.

Lermontov's works were known in Bulgaria even before the Liberation of the country, but they gained wide popularity only later. The generations of the 1980s and 1990s were introduced to them in high school. According to contemporaries, often after noisy disputes in literary circles, they sang in chorus "Вы хожу один я на доругу", recited many poems by the great poet by heart - in Russian, as was fashionable at the time. Lermontov's work is known to the Bulgarian intelligentsia directly in the original. This is due, on the one hand, to Bulgarians - Russian graduates, and on the other - to the introduction of Russian as a mandatory subject in the schools of free Bulgaria. "When visiting Bulgarian public and private libraries, it is a common occurrence to find Russian books and especially classical works of Russian literature, including the works of M. Yu. Lermontov," wrote P. Zabolotsky in 1914. "This fact must be taken into account when talking about the acquaintance of Bulgarians with Lermontov, since only getting to know the translations of Lermontov's works and the Russian scientific literature on Lermontov in Bulgarian cannot give us a correct idea of ​​the degree of his fame among the Bulgarian educated public, which does not feel the need for translations from Russian, since it has the opportunity to read him in the original."

A number of talented poets, prose writers, and critics who had previously been captives of formalism and modernism entered contemporary Argentine progressive literature. These writers with a wide creative range, such as the literary critic and philosopher Aníbal Ponce, the fiction writers Raúl Lara and Álvaro Junque, the poets José Portogallo and José Pedroni, etc., had to thoroughly experience the false incarnations of idealistic thinking in order to subsequently see the profound truths of Marxist-Leninist ideology. A decisive role was played by the impetus of the ongoing events, especially the influence of the great ideas of the October Socialist Revolution of 1917 and the Spanish Civil War of 1936-1939. Only then were they inspired and motivated by such a bright singer of the revolution as Vladimir Mayakovsky, as well as by the notable poets of the progressive world as Paul Eluard, Pablo Neruda, Louis Aragon, and others.

In early 1963, the famous progressive German director Erwin Piscator staged a one-act play in West Berlin: "The Vicar" ("The Deputy") by the young German playwright Rolf Hochhut. Since then, Hochhut's play has been performed in many European cities, in London and Basel, Stockholm and Paris. Everywhere it provokes violent reactions, disputes and discussions, which testify to its relevance and acute civic issues. The play is built entirely on historically verified facts. The reason for its writing is the behavior of Pope Pius XII, who did not utter a word to the Nazi authorities in order to protect the millions of innocent victims of Hitler's concentration camps, including Catholic Jews. The play sharply raises the question of the moral character and pseudo-humanity of the vicar (the vicegerent of God on earth), i.e. the pope. This character of hers awakens many passions. Ultra-clerical and neo-fascist circles in the West express their dissatisfaction with the play in various ways and try to disrupt the performances of the theaters where it is played. However, the author Hochut did not have revolutionary and even less anti-Catholic intentions in writing the play. Influenced by the anti-communist psychosis of Western propaganda, he refused to let Czechoslovak theaters stage his play. On this occasion, the famous Slovak writer Ladislav Mniačko, author of the recently acclaimed book "Blated Reports" in Slovak literature, published in issue 30 of the current year of the Slovak weekly "Kultural Life" an open letter to the German playwright Hochut, which touches on a number of more general issues and arouses general interest. Below we publish the text of the letter.

There are writers who play a major role in public and literary life, but remain alien to the "noisy fame". Their activity resembles those deep water currents that change the climate, enable flowers and trees to grow in distant northern countries, while they themselves are inconspicuous, invisible, unknown. Such a creator in our communist anti-fascist literature is Nikolay Khrelkov. His charm as a person and a poet, his role as a communist-teacher are perfectly understood by those who had the opportunity to be in personal contact with the writer, to be friends with him, to experience his beneficial influence. "Visiting Khrelkov - shared the heroine of the RMS Lilyana Dimitrova - is a holiday for me. He seems to be a person from another world." Many writers such as Goncho Belev, Lyudmil Stoyanov, etc. To a large extent, they grew up as socialist realist artists, taking the decisive step from the general democratic anti-fascist positions to the positions of Marxism-Leninism thanks to the personal friendship and the influence that Nikolay Khrelkov had on them.

I wouldn't call Kamen Kalchev's new novel a "coup" in the writer's development, but it is undoubtedly a pleasant surprise. An author who has been visibly gaining momentum lately has reached a higher point of creative self-realization. It is hardly correct to say that he has surpassed himself. Rather, he has surpassed certain ideas of criticism about his creative possibilities. Because even in his most contemporary books in terms of subject matter, in his most noble responsiveness to the conflicts of the current day, Kalchev satisfied critical demands halfway, kept critical approvals at a very moderate level.

There is a motto of Marx, which in Russian sounds like this: "Be yourself and go your own way!" There is no more appropriate motto for a person and an artist with firm and unshakable convictions, for a complete personality that is always organic in its manifestations and does not deviate from the chosen path. Sometimes this striving for fidelity to oneself can cost extraordinary efforts, great moral endurance and readiness for sacrifice. The upheavals of time, surprising tremors and storms can confuse the weaker and break the susceptible to insidious temptations, break his resistance and turn him from a subject into an object of events. However, the stronger will not submit to circumstances and will not give up his essence. For me, this motto radiates nobility unclouded by time, apostolic selflessness and consistency in his convictions. He has no relation to those who play in life as on a stage, and after each intermission they put on a new costume, after each act they take a higher note. We know from history that all revolutions and the eras that followed them had their knights and silent heroes, but also their inevitable grimaces - I think a German poet said this back in the last century.

Efrem Karanfilov is one of those authors for whom writing is not a casual occupation. He is usually not satisfied with a banal, impersonal examination of works and problems, because writing an article for him is a way to express himself, to express his attitude towards things, to communicate his discoveries about people and literature. He feels a writing vocation within himself, he is possessed by the ambition to involve readers in his thoughts, to instill in them his convictions. Naturally, the literary works he writes about are not indifferent to him, his attitude towards them is very active. With their images and ideas, they unleash the flow of his own thoughts and moods and always evoke certain emotional reactions. These features apply to E. Karanfilov's work in general, but they are manifested to the highest degree in his essays. Because this is indeed a very suitable genre for an author with his inclinations and temperament. The essay gives him exactly that complete freedom that he needs - to follow his thoughts, unbound by preconditions.

Boris Delchev's new book is devoted entirely to the work of the generation of poets born between the two wars, most of whom developed their creative work after September 9th. This fact alone indicates that it has a direct bearing on the vital issues of our contemporary literature. Written with skill and argumentation, with intellectual nerve, the book draws the creative physiognomies of Veselin Khanchev, Bozhidar Bozhilov, Aleksandar Gerov, Ivan Radoev, Aleksandar Vutimski, Tsvetan Spasov. Delchev sheds abundant light on the complex problematics and contradictions of their poetry, on the winding creative and civic path of the main poets of the generation.